Following on from the earlier Natural Environment White Paper, FDF considers that the White Paper correctly argues the need to protect our rivers and lakes as fully functioning ecosystems as a key principle underpinning the action needed now to tackle pollution and over abstraction.

January 2012

The Paper is also correct to point out that left unchecked this issue is
likely to get worse with the combined effects of climate change and population
growth.
However when identifying future demand pressures on the water supply system the
White Paper fails to acknowledge the implications of addressing the challenges
set out in the Government's Foresight report on 'The Future of Food and
Farming'
published last year.

This stated very clearly that changes in the UK (along with the global) food
and farming system will be needed in order that it can produce more and with
less
impact in order to meet the twin challenges of future food security and climate
change. This will have consequences for the food and farming sector's future
water needs and which suggests that some kind of priority use hierarchy (with a
bias towards uses that are of national importance) in situations of water
scarcity
should be considered as part of a reformed abstraction system.

Without some form of strategic prioritisation there is a risk that discretionary
uses, such as irrigation for golf courses, take precedence over activities such
as food production simply on a basis of ability to pay.